The Saxophonist
by Saartha
Summary: Chapter Three: The End. 'This was the end. She knew it, welcomed the maw of oblivion. And yet…and yet…Her thoughts inevitably return to the Saxophonist, and herself, and the boy…'
1. The Cafe

Raven sighed. It wasn't a sigh of contentment, or frustration, or relaxation. It was a sigh of _being_, a slow exhale that reminded herself of her own existence. In a way, that elongated breath tried to contain everything that she was or ever had been, like the murmurings of an ancient house remembering its days of glory, seconds before it collapses. It was that sort of sigh.

The wind of her breath tangled with the steam from her tea, knotting and unraveling, combining and dissipating. The vapor diluted and rose tortuously upward, disappearing into the haze of cigar smoke and the tendrils from other drinks that clung persistently to the ceiling.

She watched the misty cartwheelings, warming her hands with the heat radiating from the cheap white cup. Steam would up, and wound up, and wound up…Forming deformed phantasmal figures, breaking in the drafts only to come together again with the next breath in completely different shapes.

She contemplated the smoke. An eye emerges, morphing instantaneously into an unidentifiable animal, like a mix between snake and lizard. It rotates, the tail reaching out and slowly turning into a misshapen book before quietly drifting into nothingness.

Her eyes blinked, a sluggish process that seemed to take millennia, then turned away from the fluctuating, fractal-like images. A sip of tea warmed her throat, seeping down to melt her insides.

Snapping fingers assaulted her ears, reverberating inside her head like the pitter-patter of an ungentle rain. A woman beamed, flushed from the praise, and launched into another poem, clichéd and just as poorly written as the first. Raven grimaced. Amateur poetry was almost as painful as amateur karaoke. It was an emotional piece, though, and for that; Raven envied her. She, herself, had given up writing long ago. How could a person write when she can't experience, or even comprehend the emotions that she writes about?

Her last poem, years ago, had been perfect in meter, rhyme scheme, grammar…But that very perfection was an imperfection. Flawless poetry is inevitably inhuman. Machines should never compose, or it becomes a mockery of the art. Raven accepted that, and hadn't set pen to paper since.

The woman stepped down amidst the snaps for her terrible, imperfect, beautiful poem. Another stood to take her place. A tall man, ever-fashionable in black, smoothly ascended to the stage. Light glinted off the saxophone in his hands. He took a seat on the sole stool, and the café was silent.

She glanced around. There were people from all walks of life sitting side by side, settling in like children for a bedtime story. Anticipation thickened the air. This was the one, then. This was the Saxophonist, the man with no name, the man she had been waiting for all night. He didn't appear to be special in any way. A face that could have belonged to anyone, the build and skin tone of thousands of people. Not distinguishing marks at all.

And yet…even the cooks had materialized from the kitchen, leaning against doorways or going so far as to sit with the patrons. Room was made quickly, hastily, but above all: silently. Nothing about the Saxophonist demanded respect. The people gave it, regardless.

She produced earplugs from a pocket and put them in. They made no difference at the moment, but she didn't want to be caught unawares when he started playing. The man on stage taped the microphone with his finger and, satisfied, said a few words short words that were most likely an introduction. It was a curious sensation, listening without hearing.

He paused, and breathed. The audience breathed with him, and the room was filled with the soft sighs of dozens of people. Raven found herself breathing along with them, and forced herself to return to a more natural rhythm. What was it about this man that made him so enrapturing?

His face was passive, controlled. Every part of his body was still. It was like…it was _exactly_ like, she realized, a meditation. Not a deep one, but meditation nonetheless. There was no evidence of stage fright or tension in his posture. He was calm in a way that very few people experienced in their lifetimes.

Hands slowly, slowly moved and positioned themselves over the keys. The instrument glinted, a sharp contrast to his dark clothing. Unremarkable eyes closed, opened, and he began to play.

In that instance, Raven was lost. The notes were filled with pure, undiluted emotion. Sadness swept against her like a wave. Despair. Frustrated anger. It wasn't fair! The entire world was suffering, dying, and there was nothing she could do about it. His face raged, and she raged. Any world that left the deaths of innocents were left unnoticed was wrong. A child could wake up to find his parents dead, and no one would do a thing to help. The child, the boy, the wretch could and would live on the sidewalks, spit upon by the rich people who's doorsteps he sleeps upon, who's garbage he steals from, who watch as he staves and wastes away into nothing more than a bundle of hair and dirt and don't care at all.

What kind of a world was it that allowed its future to rot away, to wither and die in the face of impossible conditions? Was there nothing to be done, to prevent the corruption and destruction of the innocent and helpless? The wails of thousands, ignored by the few that could help…something had to be done. Something had to happen, or everything would fail. A revolution was needed.

But every revolution in history had been based on violence, on death, acts which left even more people suffering than before. This had to be different. The last revolution, the uprising to end all uprisings, had to be bloodless. A pacifist's world could not be made with brutality.

The human race could only survive for so long if things continued as they were. And really, that was the ultimate shame. People, whether put on earth by a deity or evolved from monkeys, had a seemingly infinite capability to live, to thrive and learn, to become _better_.

But how could a species improve, when its members battle against themselves, ignoring the needs of the many to support the greed of the few? Where was justice, when some had the arms of luxury wrapped firmly around them and others competed with the rats for garbage scraps?

The child; the homeless and helpless kid whom everyone failed to see in a futile attempt to exonerate themselves from the guilt of failing their race. The hope of the future died on a dismal winter morning, huddled in a muddy alleyway. Not from the cold, or anything so gentle as starvation. Instead, the poor boy's life was ushered out by knifepoint for the sake of a frozen bird carcass.

He died, painfully and bloodily. He died alone, with no arms around to comfort him in his final moments. He died, and not a single person cared.

He died, and the world never noticed.

And out of his abused corpse cam his soul, the decision for his afterlife made in a heavenly split-second. Cruel paradise held no desire for a wraith how had never truly lived. Hell had no place for a boy how had never done anything worse than steal trash for food. His fate was limbo, neither life nor death. He was to remain only slightly more substantial than a ghost until he did something with his 'life,' until he proved himself worthy of either heaven or hell.

The boy stood bewildered over his own body, yet again proven to be unwanted by even god. He stood for days, himself his only eulogy, and then he left.

Years passed. He slept, though he was not tired. He ate, and his body rejected the rood. He grew, but only out of habit. He traveled across the world and saw pain wherever he went, with only the rare places of sanctuary to break up the torment.

The world…it was wrong. It was sick, corrupted, tainted into a terrible place. No kid should ever have to die alone and unloved like he had. That would be his calling, his service. That was what he was going to do to prove himself to the merciless God. His death would never be repeated. He would heal the world.

Flashes of events. Struggles against the close-minded. Decades of strife—a kaleidoscope of color and emotion—the pain of denied rest—the hope of attaining—the despair of failing—the ache of his long-suffering soul—

It ended abruptly. Raven was aware of herself again. The café was still, drowning in its own silence. The _universe_ was silent, watching and breathing as the man on stage put down his gleaming saxophone and leaned toward the microphone. He spoke…and she could not hear a thing.

She strained, leaning towards him, but nothing changed. Oh, of course. The earplugs. Her hands reached for her ears, then froze. If she couldn't hear his voice, _how had she heard the music?_

And yet…Thinking back on it, she couldn't remember a single note.

The man left the stage, and she followed after him, pushing past people as they frantically dug into their wallets. A donation box labeled 'Child Welfare Fund' was quickly filled to overflowing. Raven finished removing her earplugs, allowing the sudden clamor of voices to assault her ears.

She caught sight of her quarry and tracked him up a set of dinghy stairs, leaving behind the frenzied donating-fest. A sign on the wall instructed her that the stairs led to the roof. The racket of the crowd faded into a muted murmur as she ascended.

The Saxophonist was always just out of sight on the circling staircase. She did not bother to call out, to ask him to wait. His very evasiveness was evidence that he knew she was there. If he wanted to let her get closer, then he would. They quickly

When she did catch up, he was leaning against a rusted metal balcony, staring out at the view of the city. He was quiet for a long while. "Remove your disguise." He said finally. His voice was bland, unamused. "I can see past it, anyway."

"My…Oh." She had forgotten about the ring. Cyborg had given it to her when he learned she was bothered by people recognizing her when she went out. It had become such a vital part of her nights that she had stopped giving it much thought. She pulled it off. Her skin and hair returned to their normal shades, out of place against her jean and t-shirt mask. "Better?" She asked, slipping the circlet into her pocket.

"Yes. Now, let's dispense with the pleasantries. Are you here to kill me? I've heard that you, of all the Titans, dislike the power of the supernatural."

Raven laughed dryly. "It would be rather hard for me to kill you, Saxophonist. The undead tend not to die twice. The best I could to is try to banish you, I think. But the answer your question, no. I _had_ intended to arrest you for brainwashing. That is why I'm here in the first place.

"We've been getting reports all over the city of people going to your performances and coming back completely different. A greedy billionaire donating millions to charity, a heartless criminal reforming and turning himself in, a cold-minded businessman transformed into the loving benefactor of an orphanage. We were afraid that there was an ulterior motive behind it all, but I think we can relax now. We can trust you not to take the money and run."

"…Because I am dead?"

"Don't be ridiculous. You said before that I hated the supernatural. That was incorrect. I am wary, because I know what that power can do in the wrong hands. The Titans have battled villains from all over the world, but they have never truly understood how terrifying it would be if the least of those we have fought gained powers.

"They call the magic tricks we've run up against supernatural, but even Slade is nothing compared to the power given to those who trade their souls for it. You could have destroyed the world ten times over by now. That fact that you haven't is good enough for me to not interfere. I trust you because you have proven yourself a good person, dead or not."

He turned away from her, but not before she caught a glimmer of a smile forming on his face. "So." He temporized, clearly at a loss as to how to respond. "What did you think of my playing?"

"Didn't hear a note." She let out another dry laugh at his incredulous reaction. "You didn't think I'd voluntarily subject myself to the effects of your song, did you? I wore earplugs. I didn't realize that what you did was reach straight into the minds of your audience and plant images and emotions there. You use the instrument as a sort of focus, right? A concentration point."

He nodded, and she stepped up and placed her hands on the balcony rail. "How annoying. I'll have to tell the others that I was wrong. I told them that your powers probably came from the saxophone itself. I do hate being wrong."

He was silent, and she was silent, looking at the rooftops. A fall breeze left her reaching for her cloak before belatedly remembering her disguise. She returned her hands to the bar, ignoring the sensation of pebbling skin.

"You realize…" She commented gently, "What you're striving for won't happen quickly. Child neglect has been going on since the beginnings of life. Almost every civilization in the universe has some form of abuse that goes unnoticed. It may-"

"Does it go on where you came from?" He cut in, keeping his eyes fixed on the buildings.

Raven blinked. "No." Azarath had always prided itself on that fact.

"Then there is hope for Earth yet, even if it takes me centuries to show people what they are doing."

They were quiet again. Another wing gust left her shivering, but failed to so much as touch him. Suddenly, she smiled. "Your work is imperfect."

His head came up, a puzzled and mildly affronted expression on his face. "What do you mean by that?"

"Don't worry. It was a compliment." She straightened and turned away, walking towards the staircase door.

"Will you be coming back to hear me play again?"

She shook her head. "No. It's a minor miracle that this experience failed to trigger an apocalypse. Actually listening to your performance might undo me."

He gazed at her with the disconcerting, all-knowing eyes of the dead. "…I understand. I am sorry for endangering your control, Raven."

"It's not your fault," She said, twisting the handle and stepping into the dark landing. "I will see to it that the Titans do not interfere with your life's work. Not that we could, really." She laughed quietly to herself, slipping the ring back on her finger. Her brown hair stirred in the air, sifting across tan skin. "Goodbye, Saxophonist."

The door clicked behind her, leaving the ghost behind. As the fall breeze parted around him, he wondered if even he could play the requiem of a machine…


	2. Wind and the Machine

"You are done, then?"

The man, eternally dressed in symbolic black, said nothing. His hands grasped the neck of a bronze saxophone, strangling it until his knuckles turned white and the bones creaked softly, undetectably.

"Your work is finished. There is no one left for you to save, Saxophonist." Soft, yet firm. A brisk autumn wind giggled past them. He shivered as it touched him, sneaking a cold taste of his skin. The sensation left him gasping for breath, his wind stolen by its own kind.

"You can rest now, you know. There's nothing to keep you here, to keep you awake." She shivered with him, sharing his trembling life-throes. It had been decades since their last meeting, years that had wrinkled her face and bent her spine. Her eyes were a tired violet, like wilting irises. She had not aged well. The weight of living breaking her as it broke all others. No one aged well… except those who did not age.

The sun hung fat and close, a pregnant woman sighing as she laboriously lowered herself onto the ground. The wind punted a can around their feet, making it yammer like a playful dog. It barked its way between the bent and twisted balcony bars, plummeting off the roof to the streets below, lost into the mist and shadows.

The man forced himself to loosen his grip on the saxophone and leaned it gently against the bars. He placed his hands on the rail- just so. Wrinkled fingers slipped next to him, instinctively finding the spot they had filled so many years ago. He looked at the hands, flesh sagging gently in quiet surrender to gravity. The fingers were bony, brittled and gnarled.

"What is keeping you here? You've been working towards you goals for so many years…Why are you hesitating now?" He could almost see the young girl he had known, her delicate arms, the youthfully mature face, the wise-beyond-her-time attitude…

The wind rushed again. He clutched at himself, trying futilely to be untouched by the cold. It mocked him, tugging his ribs. "You can feel it now, can't you. Feel yourself living."

Ice crystals snuck into his lungs, setting up freezer-burned castles. He coughed, dislodging a few. "I… I can feel myself _dying_."

"It's the same thing. You've just forgotten."

"Is it like this for everyone? This-" He coughed again. "-this cold?" She nodded, and he shuddered. "What a miserable existence. Small wonder that abuse existed. I feel like I want to hurt you, just so that I can forget my own pain for awhile." The chill that pervaded his body could be eased by her blood, he knew. He wanted to break her, to sooth himself with her cries…but that would go against everything he believed in, everything that he had taught.

The relief would only be temporary, anyways. This 'soul-frost' always came back. She was silent, gazing unperturbedly out on the partially demolished buildings. The brilliant shine on the old windows had worn down in the century since their last meeting. The once-proud skyscrapers were crumbling under their own weight, slowly decaying beneath the autumn sunset. A hundred years ago, the homeless would have wandered the pockmarked streets, scrabbling with each other for scraps.

He had put an end to that. There wasn't a single person in Jump City who was without shelter, and cities all across the world had already begun to adopt the practices he had taught. Poverty was on its way out. They didn't need him anymore. So… why was he so unwilling to rest?

"I am afraid, I think." He told the wind. "I have worked so long to reach heaven that I forgot what it was I was working for. I don't remember what its like to love God, or why I should want to go to paradise. I am afraid to let go of my work, no matter that it doesn't need me now. It's all I know."

"That is all any of us know, truly. But you have been working for much longer than a regular human. Heaven was cruel to you in that." She huddled inside the blue sweater clinging to her arms as a fresh wind ruffled her skirts. "It was not fair to keep you here for so long. I think… God is not as loving as he is said to be. Blasphemy it may be, but he seems more like a machine than a doting father. More interested in the well-being of the whole than of the individual. It's really the only way, but some suffer because of it. The whole can't be maintained and improved without sacrifices."

"That doesn't make it any less painful for me."

"I know. I am sorry, Saxophonist; but I can't make it better. I'm a sacrifice, myself."

"I-" he broke off, convulsing silently, clenching his eyes closed. His face lost color, cadaver-like. "…I don't want to die!" He choked out, trembling. "I haven't lived yet, I haven't had fun or been married, or read the great classics or…" He shook, staring into the wind with wild eyes.

Her soft voice barely crested the bluster. "Would it have made a difference if you had?" No response, but she knew he was listening. A bit of the wildness faded. "What kind of a measure of life is that? How many books you've read, or children you've produced- it doesn't matter, in the end. You helped rid the human race of a great evil. That's all anyone, even God, can ask of you."

"But, why? Why was it _me_ who had to go through all of this?"

"Because the individual must work for the good of the whole, else they both fail. It's like…you're a kidney in a huge body. Sometimes, the kidney gets overworked. Abused. But-it has to keep working, else the body becomes poisoned and _everything_ dies. You are a part of something much larger, a part of the divine plan of a machine. It goes past you or me."

"You think that every person who ever lived is a tool, a 'deus ex machina' of sorts…Raven, are you saying that there is no such thing as an individual mind?"

She laughed dryly. "Of course there is. The kidney and the heart can't have the same set of instructions. The body wouldn't work if every part acted the same way. There's no denying that each person is different, but there's also no telling whether or not those differences are free will or just another one of God's creations. Either way, the species depends on these differences, on the individuals chosen to _make_ a difference."

"So- my life was necessary to keep the body functioning? To keep society working?"

"Yes. A grain of sand balancing an entire beach. It's a delicate wire that God draws, but he draws it well."

He nodded, half to himself and half to her comment, shivering spasmodically. His hands found the saxophone and held it lovingly, gently. "I…am afraid." He said quietly.

"Everybody is, when faced with their own death. Oblivion, the unknown, is a terrifying thing."

Wind rattled down the instrument's throat, producing a low mournful wailing that captured the attention. He listened to it in surprise. "When I first met you on this roof, so many years ago, I tried to play your song. But, for whatever reason, I couldn't capture it. That note…it was you, Raven, in a way that I could never play. Wind in a machine…"

She smiled, understanding. He coughed, then let out a short, barking laugh and raised the saxophone over his head, offering it up. "I submit!" He cried into the wind, to the wind, to god, to death. "I will rest. My work is finally, _finally done_!" The saxophone glimmered, shimmered, and dimmed, and he gently, lovingly hurled it over the balcony railing. She watched it fall, disappearing into the shadows below…

He was gone when she turned back. Simply, completely, austerely gone. Wind rushed gleefully through her, touching but not gripping. She sighed and achingly made her way to the stairs. The Saxophonist's face had been ecstatic, relieved, and completely unselfish, ready to accept his place by the machine who loved and yet did not love. She was happy for him, happy that he had found peace, and yet…she was so envious…

The steps were old. They hadn't been beautiful, the first time she had tracked him down, but now they threatened to crumble under even her slight weight. She paused halfway down, touching the railing and watching in her mind's eye as she, young, pursued the ghost. The Titans were waiting for her at the Tower, waiting for her to report. They had been so shocked when she informed them that anyone who went after the player would answer to her.

She smiled at the memory, sighed, and continued on. The bottom floor was in even worse repair, littered with glass and garbage. The café, once a new building on the outskirts of the city, had been abandoned as the buildings spread past it and competition forced it out of business. It was now at the hollowed-out core, waiting to be demolished. Most of the inner city was like that, now.

A fence covered the entrance, a deterrent for what few 'gangs' remained, mostly a bunch of kids who didn't know what gangs used to be like. She fazed through it, stumbling slightly on the other side. Her powers had become harder and harder to use as time passed. Much of it was lack of use, a muscle left largely dormant. Some of it, though, was age. Her decrepit body no longer had the sheer physical endurance for the higher magics, no matter how able her mind remained.

She wandered aimlessly, not wiling to go back to her empty apartment. Ever since Cyborg had turned himself off, she had been so lonely. Nightwing had been the first to go. The Boy Wonder, as he had still been fondly called by his friends, had died in his armchair at a ripe old age of eighty-seven, leaving behind Wayne Enterprises for his wife and son to manage. Starfire joined him six months later after setting her affairs in order. His protégé was still running around somewhere in Africa, beating down the crime there with his mix of martial arts and green energy bolts.

Raven had gone to both funerals. She, Changeling, and Cyborg had each said a handful of words at Nightwing's ceremony. Starfire had entered into a ritual of silence, as was apparently tradition in Tamaran. They spoke again at her funeral, well prepared words that masked the overwhelming grief.

They were buried in the old Tower grounds. Reporters, fans, international dignitaries, everyone who could showed up. It was broadcasted worldwide, and some countries declared the day a national holiday out of respect.

Changeling went a couple of years later, leaving behind thousands of mourners and the legacy of a very successful acting career. His wife, a pleasant blond he'd met while shooting a movie, played the grieving widow well. The rind that concealed his distinctive coloring onscreen came off, leaving behind the green that had faded only slightly from his youth. He would have wanted it that way, never ashamed of what he was. The children looked largely like their mother, except for the odd pale olive tinge to their hair… He had kept his humor till the very end. It was hard for Raven to imagine life without prank calls left on her answering machine.

She and Cyborg, who was still devastated by the death of his long-time best friend, had tried living together for a short time. It fell apart quickly, feeling too much like trying to complete a puzzle with all but two pieces missing. He spent most of his time at Star Labs, anyway. Her own job at the psychiatric ward sorting through the minds of the crazies kept her busy, but not busy enough.

They kept in contact over the following years, annual visits and occasional phone calls. Eventually, they were the only ones left. Speedy and Bumblebee passed; Aquaman swam into the ocean for his final entombment. The twins, Mas y Menos, went out hand in hand. Hot Spot supernovad, taking out a chunk of forest with him. Wildebeest disappeared into the wilderness. She suspected that even the old Hive members had long since died.

Years passed, and more years passed, and she retired long past the time she should have. She lived in her lonesome apartment, meditating the days into a blur of not-time. Her blood, part immortal and part human, kept her body alive for far longer than that of a normal person. She watched as those she loved died, and she meditated, and she remained behind…

Cyborg had confided in her, during one of their lunches, that he was tired. "Not physically," he clarified. "Mentally. I should have died a long time ago, with the rest of our generation." His metal parts were still as polished as they had ever been in their youths, and she suspected that his synthetic muscles were as strong as ever. But he was slumped, worn down. His eye, the real one, looked as weary as she knew her own did.

So, it came as no real surprise a year later when she learned he had voluntarily powered down his mechanical parts. She went through the tired motions of going to the funeral, said a few words to the press, and…nothing. Years passed, and years passed, and years passed…

There was no telling how long her blood would stave off death. It was like that old Greek legend about the man who had been granted immortality, but not eternal youth. He wasted away, cursed to forever age and never die. But at least he was cared for by the goddess of love, Aphrodite. Raven was all alone.

Occasionally, the blur of days was broken up by reporters or students looking for an interview from a person who remembered the era of gangs, poverty, and crime for a school report or an article in a corner of the newspaper. Sometimes the current mayor asked her to perform a ceremony. She involuntarily declined, refusing to be a trained monkey. She did get some satisfaction, though; when whoever the mayor was at the time realized she didn't know his name. Leadership, she had found, changed too often for her to bother keeping up with.

A roaring sound assaulted her ears. Her wanderings had brought her to the bay, the water a green-grey in preparation for the oncoming winter. The sun had fallen sometime during her musings, leaving only the thinnest line of red light on the horizon. It was barely enough to see by, but out across the swells an island could be made out. The island that had once held a proud tower of great renown, and now held only the dust of four forgotten heroes.

Nightwing had ordered the tower to be destroyed when it became apparent that the Titans' services were no longer needed. It was a symbol, he had said, that the city didn't need protection anymore. All Raven knew was that she had to help tear down the only home she'd had since she came to earth.

With the end of the Tower came the end of the Titans. They scattered, Nightwing and Starfire traveling to other countries to continue fighting on their own, Changeling and Cyborg settling down to their careers and families, and Raven…Raven was left to her meditation.

She shivered, and wished for her old cloak for the first time in a long while. The island waited, stonily silent, for the final piece of its collection. She wanted to be there, with her friends, but the wind teased, refusing to grasp her.

She stood for a long, long moment, silent tribute and sentinel of the only family she had ever known. Her heart ached…and she didn't bother to suppress the feeling.

"Hey-ma'am! Ma'am!" She whirled, summoning a black glow to her hands. A Peacekeeper stood, unconcerned, a few feet away. "There's going to be a storm." He told her gently. "You might want to get inside." She banished the magic on her hands, embarrassed by her outdated instincts.

He was right, she realized. The wind had ushered in dark clouds, blotting out what was left of the light. "You could catch your death of cold on a night like this."

Raven stared at him, then laughed humorlessly as she turned her feet towards her dark, empty apartment. "That-" she said as her bones ached in protest. "-is a very tempting offer." And she left the bemused Peacekeeper behind. Tempting, but no. She would wait until the wind caught her, and she would experience the ultimate relief of finishing her own work, the relief that had been on the Saxophonist's face. She could only hope that it didn't take her another century to be caught…


	3. The End

She sits in the twilight, swathed in blankets and sweaters. Her frame, once strongly petit and slender-lifetimes past- is frail and bent underneath the volumes of cloth. She sighs…a sigh that contains her existence, all the grueling centuries or being Raven, of _Being_. A sigh that encompasses her entire self, unchanged for an epochal subsistence.

Her breath creeps in, and out.

Noise comes from the apartment below her dusky balcony. The intrepid couple residing there were always very accommodating when she met them in the transporter or on the streets. She was a gorgeous brunette with glimmering teeth and sparrow-fingers, always dressed in the most eccentrically fashionable styles and chattering about the recent scandalous news. So-and-so had decided to bind with her long-time love, but everyone knew he still had eyes for this level three girl, and wasn't it silly of her to think she could compete with someone like that?

He was the stereotypical average guy, placidly boring and appearing mostly content to be publicly overshadowed by his gregarious bondmate. When they were alone, though…He seethes, rising against her, lashing out against his own submissive shortcomings, the world, his life, _life_. She argues with him, providing the conflict he so desperately craves. In private, he was a man, and she had more meaning than a pretty smile. They shouted and raged, and were happy.

Stars gleamed, uninhibited by the smog that had plagued the twentieth, twenty-first, twenty-second centuries. The moon sent down its stolen light, marred by the enormous grey dome of the abandoned base. Abandoned…When had that happened? A few years ago, it had been the pride of the scientific community. Or maybe it was longer…

Her breath creeps in, and out.

The noise below abates, and a peaceful apathy hangs in the autumn air. Raven huddles inside her blankets and tries to meditate the cold into deference. The tired old words trickle from her lips. "Azarath, Metrion, Zinthos. Azarath Metrion Zinthos. Azarath-Metrion-Zinthos-" She falters. The words, once so important, no longer meant anything, stringing together in so many nonsensical syllables. She was not a child anymore, fighting away the bogeymen and the monsters with her friends at her side.

The streetlights below hummed imperceptibly, nuclear energy singing gently in the underground wires. At least, she thought it was nuclear. It had been; a hundred years, two hundred years ago. It was so hard to keep track of things. Not that she really tried, anymore.

Her breath creeps in, and out.

There had been an accident the day before, or a few days. Earlier. A fire in the complex across the road. Sidewalk, really. All the old roads had become one giant pedestrian play area since the use of cars had been prohibited. The fire had broken out when a kind had wandered into the kitchen and, mimicking what he had seen his parents do, tried to light the flash oven. Things had gotten out of hand, and the boy was trapped in the blazes.

Raven had seen, or sensed, the trouble from her eternal watch on the balcony, and had responded. For a minute, she was Raven the Titan again, shedding the limitations of age and summoning the eternal blackness to her hands, phasing through the walls and snatching the child up before enveloping them both in cooling shields of dark magic.

He had been terrified. Not of the flame, of _her_. He had kicked his way out of her grasp, trying to slough off the demon-driven sorcery that coated his skin like so much dark oil, screaming and running from the phantasmal, sweater-clad witch.

He died. Her magic failed her, not strong enough to protect him from the inferno he fled to. Raven had returned achingly to her balcony, leaving the professional response units to deal with the tragedy and cleanup. Soot and charcoal marks drifted haphazardly off of her clothes and hair, drifting in the air before disintegrating. No one knew she had been there, and yet…and yet…

She shouldn't have let him get away from her, no matter the bruises his fists and tiny feet made on her paper-thin skin. No matter his fear. No matter his mindless, animal hatred.

Her breath creeps in, and out.

The experience, the use of powers long left dormant, the movement of stagnant muscles…it had exhausted her beyond measure, depleted the ever-dwindling stores of energy her broken body had managed to retain.

This was the end. She knew it, welcomed the maw of oblivion. And yet…and yet…Her thoughts inevitably return to the Saxophonist, and herself, and the boy…

Her entire life, she had lived to die.

Her entire life, she had lived unselfishly.

Her entire life, she had meditated.

Her entire life, she had submitted to her fate, done what she could to make amends for her own existence, worked and strove and struggled for forgiveness and acceptance. And in the end, she was still feared…and she was still afraid.

Her entire life, she had lived in fear.

When she had first met the Titans, she had been so uncertain about herself. The rage Azar had taught her to smother was becoming harder and harder to control. Emotions broiled within, hurling themselves against the cool meditative barriers she had so painstakingly erected. The Titans, new teammates she found herself with without ever really understanding how, were smashing the wall down from the other side, yearning to know what the girl behind the witch was like. She was afraid of letting that girl out, because the innocence and purity- the white that she embodied- could so easily be tainted by her father's blood.

Her father had ensured she lived in constant fear. Fear of him, of herself, _for_ herself. The dreams and whispered possessive comments tormented her young mind, and she feared what she could so easily become…

And then, when Trigon failed and the end of the world was averted, she was afraid she wouldn't be accepted again by her friends, by the world she had so nearly destroyed.

When the Titans split and went there separate ways, she was afraid her mind would break and she would end up as Starfire had foreseen. That very apprehension had almost fulfilled itself _because_ she worried about it so much.

When the Titans died, she clung to the walls between herself and the world, and she feared what would happen if the walls came down.

She feared her powers, her control, her lack of control, herself, the world, her solitude, chaos, and _she was afraid_…

Her breath creeps in, and out.

The biggest fear…was that she hadn't done enough. All she had done, all the lives she had saved- was it enough? The Saxophonist had made his peace with her help, but now the eye of the machine god had turned to her.

Her life…was finally closing. Her demons were sealed, her friends waited, and her fears were meaningless… Were meaningless? No. That couldn't be right. Her fears were part of her humanity, of her consciousness and her conscience. It was reasonable to be terrified, because life was horribly cruel when you were chosen to be a sacrifice for the good of mankind. And really, what more could be asked of her? She failed, sometimes, but she did her best. The constant suppression of herself without losing the battle between insanity and control…She had given up herself, her freedoms, her right to _live_; all for the world, a world that never accepted or understood her in all the time she had lived, a world that feared her as much as she feared it.

That…was enough. She'd had enough. She had _done_ enough. It didn't matter anymore, if the world with their sparrow-fingers and rage-joys failed to understand her, or even if god himself wasn't finished using her. Achingly, creakingly she stood and shed the multitudes of cloth that enshrouded her, keeping only a single blue quilt. It wrapped around her shoulders, trailing at her feet, and a sense of nostalgia washed over her. She slipped a hand on the railing.

A brisk wind rises, whispering sweet everythings. The time had come to finally accept herself, to embrace what she was and what she had done. To experience happiness and anger and anything, _anything_ but fear. Maybe…maybe that was why she had been kept alive so long. It had taken her that long to love herself…

In a week's time, she would be forgotten, the last relic of ancient times fading into oblivion. That was fine. This wasn't her era, anyways. Her time had ended long, long, long ago. All that was left was a ghost…

The autumn breeze whirled, sweeping through- no, sweeping _into_ her. It slid across her skin, beckoned gently…and she followed it.

She could not see to the end of the wind. There was no way to know where it would lead her. But she knew, as she left behind the crumpled husk, the demon blood, the uncertainty, the fear…she knew her family would be waiting. Waiting for their friend to finally, finally come home. And a man, ever fashionable in black, would be amidst their ranks...

Her breath creeps out…


End file.
